BTW, THIS IS NOT THE CHRISTMAS FIC I'M STILL WORKING ON, BUT ANYWAY!
Merry Christmas, everybody! ♥
I actually started writing this fic... in the summer of last year. I think. I completely stopped writing it after realizing that it was a fic full of my squicks. LOL! But after reading the script I had at that time again, I decided to finish it after all. It was quite challenging. I mean, I wrote my own squick fic! (But there's no character death, don't worry. XD)
This fic might be a little too dark for the general Christmas mood? Hm. Maa maa.
Anyway, now I have to go and see my sister's Christmas musical!
Bye for now. ♥
*Sorry for the HTML errors. Fixed now. -_-;;
Title: Words That We Couldn't Say
Fandom: Johnny's Entertainment
Characters: Akame, Jin/OC, Kame/OC
Theme: #30 - Love
Rating: PG-13
Genre: future AU, slash, het, mild angst
Summary: We're not teenagers anymore, Jin. We're not young enough anymore to afford the price we have to pay.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything but the plot and the OCs, I guess.
A/N: This fic is "unclassified, open-end, in-between", according to takagi, who was so kind to beta the fic (twice ^^;;) for me. I believe she's correct, so please proceed at own risk. Abuse of italics. Oh, I forgot, I'm dedicating this fic to takagi because I owe her. LOL.
Word Count: 9,435
Words That We Couldn’t Say
- We're not teenagers anymore, Jin. We're not young enough anymore to afford the price we have to pay.
- But we can still pretend, can't we?
Back Then - Kame
They were young at that time.
The sun that had shone mercilessly upon them during the day had long disappeared and the sickle moon had become its replacement, but even the faint moonlight was hidden behind blocks of heavy clouds, forging pitch darkness at the instant. The temperature dropped considerably, but it was still uncomfortably hot as the boy felt the slick fabric of his sleeping bag glued to his sweating body. Not to mention the mosquitoes that were equally annoying. The jumbling noises by day had perished from the beach. The only sounds left were the periodic roar of the ocean and the calm breathing of his best friend next to him, sound asleep.
He couldn't sleep despite the tiring day they had to endure. He could tell that his friend had been in a bad mood since midday. It wasn't hard to tell since his friend didn't exactly hold back voicing out his utter discontentment. But he, on the other hand, couldn't complain like his friend had been doing, not in front of the rolling camera.
When he turned his head slightly to the right he was not surprised that he wasn't able to even make out the silhouette of the other at all. He couldn't see him although they were so close, so very close.
It was a bit frightening. He knew that his eyes were open, but no matter how hard he tried to glimpse or to blink, he couldn't see anything beside darkness and more darkness. It was as if he had turned blind, as if he had been trapped in an empty and black vacuum with no way out. Somewhere deep inside he had the burning urge to call out to his friend, wake him up and be relieved to hear a muffled and annoyed voice as response.
But he didn't do it.
It was a bit frightening, but he wasn't really afraid.
He wasn't really afraid because although he couldn’t see him, he could hear his breathing, and he knew that he was there.
He was sure that, back then, they had been there. Together.
--
Today's Now - Kame
Kamenashi woke up slowly from the dream that was more a memory - a memory that always puts a smile on his face. He took down his arm, which he had used to cover his eyes, and blinked. He stared blankly at the white ceiling, and noticed that something was off.
For one, he was staring at a very unfamiliar white ceiling. Secondly, the bed sheet felt different than the ones he used at home and he noted that he was wearing a bathrobe instead of the usual pajama he would put on to sleep. His whole body felt sticky and awkward, he must have sweat a lot despite the moderate, if not a bit too cold, temperature in the room.
It took him a while to fully wake up and then it took him some more time to adjust his mind to his surroundings.
The light in the room was dim. He shifted his eyes to the left to see an air-conditioner and the few strings attached to it moving along with the cold air blown into the room. Below was a big black television on a dark varnished wooden commode. The room was dominated by yellow-tinged black and dull white colors only; black furniture, black television, but white walls, floor and white sheets - all evoking a strange visual feeling as if he was in midst of an old washed-out photography from his grandparents' generation.
In daze, he returned his gaze to the ceiling again. Kamenashi concluded that he must be in a hotel room. He just couldn't remember how he got to a hotel room last night to save his life.
Everything was plain and unfamiliar; however, there was the indistinct smell of a cigarette brand he knew well lingering in the air, and it made him feel fidgety.
He turned his head to the right; saw the rest of the room, the black couch, and her.
He was with her? Kamenashi thought. What happened last night? Last night he went home right after work, and then she called, they met up and then...
“Sorry, did I wake you up?” she asked from not afar.
He saw her dropping ashes in the glass ashtray, getting up from the couch with a smile and skipping closer to him. He sat up on the bed hesitantly.
“When have you started smoking?” Kamenashi asked, as it was the first thing that came to his mind after he had straightened himself.
“Don’t even start. You smoke, too,” she said, rolling her eyes.
He frowned and reached out to snatch the cigarette away from her, but she ducked away just in time.
“Nanami-chan,” Kamenashi said firmly. “I was asking you when you had started smoking.”
She clicked her tongue loudly. “Stop acting like you're my dad. You're not, although you're old enough to have a daughter my age,” she pointed out.
“Nanami-chan, answer my question!” Kamenashi insisted sternly, giving her one of those intimidating glares he was well-known for. Nanami laughed lightly in response as she blew out a cloud of cigarette smoke which dissipated into the air slowly.
“Geez,” she said after taking another draw, “... I don't know. I probably started after my first boyfriend dumped me. Papa said smoking was stress relieving. So I tried, it worked well, I didn't quit. Whole story.”
“I should have known that you got it from him,” Kamenashi said with a sigh. Then upon fully digesting her words, he added, “Wait. First boyfriend? Why have I never heard about you dating any boys before?”
“Do you really believe I've never been dating before?” she laughed. “Sure, I never told you all because if I had done so Papa would have scared away every single one of them, wouldn't he?”
Kamenashi laughed quietly.
“This is not funny, Kazuya,” she said and crossed her arms.
“... Since when have we become on first name basis?” he asked her, obviously startled.
“You're terrible!” she exclaimed with an austere frown. “After all that happened last night!”
“Last night?” he asked.
“Last night,” she answered, and nodded her head.
He looked at her.
“No way,” Kamenashi spurted finally. “No way, no way! I would never lay a hand on you, I-”
She just looked back at him, wearing an amused expression on her face.
--
Kamenashi, who was fully dressed by then, walked around the couch nervously. He stopped there and then, muttering inaudibly to himself and stomping loudly with his feet occasionally.
“Could you please stop doing that? It's irritating,” Nanami complained after a while.
Kamenashi swung around to look at her.
“Do you even understand the possible consequences of last night?” he said, gritting his teeth.
“I do. We spent a night together. What’s the big deal?”
“What's the big deal? Nanami-chan, you're still a child...” Kamenashi began.
“I'm eighteen now! Do you still call me a child?” she cut him off angrily.
“Yes, eighteen, you're only eighteen! There's a gap of two decades between us! Oh, what have I done?!”
She didn't say anything in return.
“What should we do now?” Kamenashi exclaimed.
“We could start dating,” she said. “As a start.”
“Are you serious?” Kamenashi asked her incredulously.
“Do I look like I'm joking?”
“... If your dad finds out about it…” Kamenashi groaned. His headache was getting worse with each passing second, especially after being informed that she had put something in his drink without him noticing last night. “... he'll kill me.”
“No,” she disagreed quietly. “Papa will kill me.”
“What are you talking about, young lady.” Kamenashi turned towards her, but he couldn't see her face.
“I’m saying the truth,” she said.
“No, Jin would never harm a hair on your head,” he said.
--
Years Ago, On Screen - KAT-TUN
“It was directly after the filming for 24 Hour TV. It was in 2006. We were getting ready to leave, ah, Kamenashi already left before us because he had a meeting for his drama, right?” Nakamaru recalled, pausing a little to look at Kamenashi. Kamenashi nodded his head slightly as confirmation, then Nakamaru continued, “So we were getting ready to leave and then Akanishi said, 'Wait a minute, I have something to tell you.' Then he said bluntly, 'I'm going to marry.' Like that.”
“Really, just like that?” said the female announcer in disbelief.
“Yes, word by word. Isn't it unbelievable?” Nakamaru grimaced at Akanishi who tilted his head and looked half embarrassed, half amused. “He came out with the news just like that! It wasn't a question or anything, it was a definite statement. They've already arranged the date of the wedding by the time he told us!”
“That must have been a shock.”
“It was! I thought he was joking at first. We all did. We've never even heard him mentioning Alice-san before, not even once, and suddenly he's telling us that he’s going to marry her! Of course you'd think he’s joking, wouldn't you? But he wasn't joking. Akanishi was serious.”
“How did you all react to the news that time?” she asked, turning to look at the rest of KAT-TUN.
Tanaka said, “I asked him whether he was joking at first as well. When he said he wasn't, I started yelling at him-”
“I remember,” Taguchi interrupted with the usual huge smile on his face and pointed at Tanaka. “You almost punched him in the face, but Ueda held you back and you got angry at Ueda and started fighting with him.”
A wild chorus of “Yes, he did, he did!” erupted immediately after Taguchi's comment.
“Really?” the announcer said. “You had a fight?”
Ueda let out a short laugh. “We thought we have gotten over the age of fighting, but it all came back to us in an instant. However, it wasn't as serious as it sounds...”
“But! I was really mad at Akanishi back then!” Tanaka confessed. “The anger just rushed to my head and I lost control of my fist.”
“I've always wanted to ask you...” Akanishi said to Tanaka. “Why did you get so mad at me?”
Tanaka wanted to protest, but Akanishi carried on without waiting.
“See, the others didn't get mad at me at all, but you - you didn't even attend my wedding! (A background chorus of “Ehhh!” erupted from the audience, even louder than before.) Everyone else went,” Akanishi complained with a laugh and started counting names with his fingers. “Ueda, Kamenashi, Taguchi and Nakamaru. Everyone from KAT-TUN went, only you didn't.”
“That's because I was mad at you!” Tanaka said loudly, and everyone began to laugh.
“See, I'm asking you why...” Akanishi insisted with an amused smile.
“I was just mad, okay? You got a problem with that!?” Tanaka yelled.
“Don't fight again!” Nakamaru said, and gestured them to calm down.
The 'fight' ended with laughter once again.
“Kamenashi-san, you weren't present to hear Akanishi's news at first, were you?” The interviewer turned her attention to Kamenashi. “How did you get to know about it?”
“Well, as for me... That's actually a funny story. I heard it from Ueda, not from Akanishi, mind you, and...” Kamenashi told the same story as he had told in many TV programs, and the press conference, before again.
He would tell it again in the next show and he would tell it again and again. A nice story about Ueda calling him, him calling Akanishi immediately afterwards and having a serious discussion with him, and so on. The audience never seemed to get tired of hearing about it.
Akanishi switched the microphone he was holding to the other hand and rubbed his nose lightly with his thumb. He stared blankly at the small video screen in front of him as the camera zoomed in on Kamenashi's concentrated face.
--
Years Ago, Off Screen - Jin
“Does Kame already know?” Ueda asked, leaning onto the raw concrete wall in the underground parking lot of the studio. The place seemed extraordinarily quiet in contrast to the scene inside the studio after Akanishi's sudden marriage announcement and after Tanaka had stomped off wearing an expression as if the whole world had turned against him.
Akanishi just stood beside him with the burning cigarette in his hand and didn't even register the question directed at him for a while. He was still in daze because of what Tanaka had screamed at him.
What about Kame, he had asked him. What about Kame?
Then Akanishi shook his head.
“No, I haven't told him yet,” he confessed silently, almost timidly.
“Then you should speak to him, Jin,” Ueda said.
“I will,” Akanishi said. He leaned his head back against the wall with a heavy sigh, and murmured, “I will.”
--
In the end Kamenashi was the one to approach him about the matter with a phone call.
“Kame?” Akanishi said after finally deciding to pick up the cell phone. He licked his lips nervously. He was awaiting an outburst of anger. (“What the fuck do you think you're doing, Akanishi Jin?” or “I can't believe you're doing this to us; to KAT-TUN, to me!”)
But all Kamenashi said was simply, “Jin.”
“Y-Yes?”
“I've already heard about it. From Ueda.”
“... You did.”
“I did.”
“So,” Jin started.
“Are you trying to be like Matsubara-san?” Kame said mockingly, however, it sounded faked to Akanishi. Kamenashi kept on talking, his voice decreased in volume, which turned into a whisper in the end, and Akanishi had troubles to fully understand him.
But he did hear him say, “Did Johnny-san ask you, 'You. It's either your work or your woman. Pick your choice!' and you said, 'My woman.' … Did it happen like that?”
“No,” Jin denied at last. “I asked whether I could keep my job, being part of KAT-TUN, and still marry, and I was told that I could. I'm going to continue work and also marry her. I'm not quitting, I don't have to. I guess the times have changed, Kame.”
“I see.”
“Kame,” Akanishi started cautiously, “if you told me not to...”
“Jin, she's pregnant,” Kamenashi interrupted harshly. “Whatever you are about to suggest, you can't do it. You can't do it to her. If you don't marry her you'll ruin her whole career, her whole life, because she's going to keep the baby, because it's your child, because she loves you. You can't do it to her!”
“I know, I know,” Akanishi said hurriedly. He shouldn’t even have thought about it, he knew that. But he really wanted to find another way with Kamenashi. It was impossible, wasn’t it?
“Do you love her?” Kamenashi interrupted again all of a sudden.
“Kame…”
“Well?”
Akanishi hesitated. “I think I do. Yes, I do.”
The person on the other side of the line fell silent. Just when Akanishi was wondering whether Kamenashi was still present on the other side, he heard a sigh. A sigh that sounded somewhat final.
“Then it's all right.” He heard him say.
After biding a brief goodbye, Kamenashi hung up on him.
Akanishi didn't know why, but he was disappointed, in a way, and scared.
Kamenashi had been calm during the entire conversation, and he had approved of his marriage in the end. He didn't get angry or shout at him. Akanishi had expected something alike to happen, having known Kamenashi, as blunt as he could be at times, for so long after all. But none of the things he had imagined and played out in his mind happened.
Kamenashi had been calm and he had been talking to him as if... as if they had been talking about an upcoming project.
That attitude scared Akanishi more than anything else.
--
Kamenashi arrived belatedly to the wedding. The rest of his family, who had all been invited, was already seated in the second front row. From behind the scene, Akanishi saw how embarrassed Kamenashi was as he was already late, and, in addition to that, had to pass all the rows, enduring the looks of the whole audience flashed at him before finally getting to his seat. Kamenashi had barely sat down next to his mother when Akanishi walked in.
Akanishi had been secretly wishing for something unexpected to happen. Something so cheesy that he's only seen it happening in old movies Kamenashi liked to watch. Akanishi remembered how Kamenashi would always cry his eyes out while he took the chance to make fun of him. Those times seemed so long ago.
He was hoping for things to happen, yet, he knew that nothing was ever going to happen the moment he saw Kamenashi standing up to give the speech, wearing a white suit and a smile so bright it hurt his eyes.
When their eyes crossed, Akanishi saw Kamenashi's smile growing wider, but he couldn't smile back at him.
--
Years Ago, Off Screen - Kame
It was a well-known fact that out of all of KAT-TUN, Tanaka was the only one who had refused to attend Akanishi's wedding.
In fact, it was a lie, since Tanaka did go to Akanishi's wedding but just didn't go inside the ceremony hall.
Kamenashi saw Tanaka standing outside, all dressed up in a suit. Tanaka even took out the bizarre hair extensions he had lately for the occasion. Kamenashi closed the door of his car and stepped slowly towards him.
“You're late,” Kamenashi remarked.
“So are you,” was Tanaka’s reply.
“True.”
They fell silent for a while.
“Aren't you supposed to give the speech?” Tanaka broke the silence first.
“Yes,” Kamenashi answered.
“Heard it from Yuichi,” Tanaka added.
“I see,” said Kamenashi.
“Maybe you should go inside now.” Tanaka nodded towards the entrance, and kicked a small pebble stone on the ground.
“Yes, I should,” Kamenashi said. “Are you coming, too?”
Tanaka didn't answer, instead he said, “I'm worried about you.”
“Why should you be worried?” Kamenashi smiled. “There's nothing to be worried about.”
“Fuck you!” Tanaka snapped. “Why are both of you acting like that! Do you really think we haven't noticed anything? Fine, I’m not going to care anymore!”
Tanaka went away in fury, leaving Kamenashi feeling even more lost than he did before.
Kamenashi tightened his fist until his knuckles began to turn white. He tried to even out his breathing, succeeded somewhat, and then stepped forward without hesitation.
--
Some While Ago - Tiara
“You and Mama are alike,” Nanami told him once; when she was still younger; when he was still younger and still uncertain about various things.
Kamenashi had just come back from Hokkaido after filming and he went to visit the Akanishi family spontaneously. But on his arrival, neither of the parents was at home. Nanami informed him that they would come back in about an hour after calling them and they asked him to stay until then. She suggested playing a board game to kill time until they returned, and he agreed.
She drew the comparison to them in the middle of the game all of a sudden.
“We are alike?” he asked, raising his eyebrows.
“Yes.” She nodded, still looking at the game board.
“We don't look alike, and our personalities are very different as well.”
“I'm aware of that,” she responded.
“Then what makes us alike in your eyes?”
Nanami looked up at him briefly, and said, “The way you look at Papa.”
She threw the dice, got doublets and bore off several of Kamenashi's checkers.
--
You look just like your father, everyone who knew her father said so.
She looked a lot like her father, and yet she wasn't Akanishi Jin.
There were people that were really nice to her because they liked her father. Equally, there were people that hated her before even knowing her because of her father. The same thing applied to her mother as well, it just didn't occur as often as in the case of her father.
Her childhood was not as pleasant and carefree as she would have liked. She was the child of two idols, her father was a Johnny’s and her mother was a popular fashion model. Her father was always away, busy with work, like many other fathers she knew. But he could never easily take off a day of work to attend her school events, celebrate her birthday with her like the other fathers could.
Somehow, she had the feeling that she had always been on her own. She thought it was okay. She thought she could deal with it. At least she still had her family and people who truly loved her.
Nonetheless, the teasing from the other kids was worse. Like when they teased her with old videos of her father doing very indecent things. She was a little girl and didn't understand what was so bad about her father dancing and singing, but she got mad about the way they talked about her father. Many times did she get mad, but she never fought with them because Kame told her that a princess would never fight with others.
Then later, she grew older, and the things that had made her angry as child turned into things that she liked to watch for her own amusement. Her father didn't like to show her the old recordings of his young idol days. But her grandmother had kept a lot of them, and she watched them whenever she found free time and visited her grandparents. It was like watching a documentary of her father's teenagehood to his adulthood. Not only her father but also the other good friends of her father, like Uncle Yamashita, Uncle Nishikido, etc.
Anyway, she watched the videos primarily for Kamenashi. She found out that Kamenashi hadn't always been the way she knew him. He had been a boy at once, a shy one. Her father, too. Once, they had all been young. Younger than her, as young as she was, then older than her, and then much older than her.
Nanami often thought about Kamenashi, and what he meant to her.
He was her favorite person besides her parents. Kamenashi was as kind to her as he was strict. She totally considered him to be part of her family, and she was happy that Kamenashi looked very happy when she told him she felt that way.
But sometimes, she thought that something was off-balance. She couldn’t depict what was bothering her. She simply noticed an imbalance within her family at times.
Then, the older she grew, the more she saw, the more she understood. For instance her mother's uneasiness whenever Kamenashi visited them. The awkwardness after he had withdrawn his hands before touching her father. The indescribable look her father would give him from time to time.
The hands.
The looks.
The words. “Jin, have you ever thought about me?”
Then there was the kiss.
Perhaps it would be wrong to call it a kiss. It was almost a kiss.
An almost-kiss that never happened, never could have happened. An almost-kiss that she pretended she had never witnessed.
But she couldn’t forget her father’s doting expression he would show to Kamenashi. He would stare at Kamenashi wearing that expression whenever he thought no one was looking his way. Why was her father like that?
She didn’t understand. But she came to a decision that day.
--
“Jin,” Alice said one night.
“What?” Akanishi grumbled sleepily.
“It's about Nanami-chan.”
“What?”
“I don't know how to put it, but,” Alice said, “she seems to be hiding something.”
“Really?”
“She's trying to hide something from us.”
“That's alright, isn't it? Who hasn't tried to hide something from their parents?”
“But it seems to be something important she's hiding.”
“She's only 10 years old, what kind of important thing does she have to hide?”
“She's going to turn 12 in two weeks, Jin.”
“She is?”
“Yes. Jin, you should at least remember the age of your daughter.”
“I do remember! I just didn't notice how fast time flew by. Nanami-chan will be 12 soon? Wow, that’s incredible, don’t you think?”
“Whatever you say.” Alice sighed. “… But at least you remembered our tenth anniversary.”
“Well,” Akanishi said, “someone reminded me.”
“Someone reminded you,” Alice repeated.
“Well, yes.”
“Who was it?”
“Oh, just someone,” Akanishi said hurriedly, and added, “I'm tired now. Good night.”
Alice whispered, “It was Kamenashi, wasn't it?”
Akanishi pretended to be asleep by then.
--
Years Ago, Off Screen - Jin
“Listen, people, listen!” Akanishi exclaimed right after swinging open the door to the dressing room.
Everyone assembled in the KAT-TUN dressing room looked towards him.
“It's a girl!” Akanishi exposed the news like he was revealing a profound secret.
“Why, thank you.” Tanaka rolled his eyes. “We know that already, Akanishi! You sent us all a message immediately after Alice informed you about it.”
Akanishi pouted. “You didn't write me back so I thought you might not have received the message at all...”
“No way, I sent you a very long congratulations message! With lots of emoticons.” Taguchi said in surprise.
“I did, too, without emoticons though,” Nakamaru said.
“Did you even check your cell phone afterwards?” Ueda asked, looking up from his boxing magazine.
“Oh, I forgot!” Akanishi laughed.
“Then don't blame it on us!” Tanaka yelled.
Akanishi simply laughed some more and goofed around with Tanaka.
Kamenashi, who stood by the side and watched Akanishi, asked suddenly, “Do you already have a name for her?”
“Yes,” Akanishi replied. “Her name will be Nanami! Akanishi Nanami!”
“Nanami…?” Kamenashi repeated the name with a frown.
“Why are you frowning?” Akanishi said indignantly.
“Not Tiara?” Kamenashi asked directly.
The others chirped in, “Right, Jin's always wanted to name his daughter Tiara, didn't he?”
“Didn’t he mention Raimu as well?”
“No, he said he wanted to name his little imaginary sister Raimu, but his daughter would be called Tiara.”
“I did and I do.” Akanishi sighed. “But Alice doesn’t like the name. She wanted her name to be Nanami, and I didn’t want to argue with her. I thought Tiara was a very pretty name. Oh well.”
“It is,” Kamenashi said insistently. “I think it is a pretty name.”
Akanishi looked at Kamenashi, surprised. Then he smiled at him, a bit bitterly, and thanked him quietly.
Later on, during the commercial break of the TV variety show, when they got a few minutes to relax, Akanishi heard Kamenashi muttering his daughter's name to himself over and over again.
“Why do you keep repeating the name?” he asked out of curiosity.
“It's a quite, well, common name, isn't it?” Kamenashi answered, staring at some undefined, distant point on the floor.
“Well...”
“Tiara would have been more uncommon, wouldn’t it?”
“It would.” Jin agreed.
“Yeah,” Kamenashi said.
Akanishi felt like he had to say something in return. He felt like Kamenashi wanted him to say something else as well. But Akanishi had so much he wanted to say that he didn't know how to begin.
Thus, the conversation ended at that.
--
Nanami was her father's precious daughter.
On the day she was born, his friends that were able to put a day off came to visit. Kamenashi was one of them. Akanishi was holding her by the time he arrived at the hospital.
When Kamenashi stretched out his index finger to touch her rosy cheeks, she moved her chubby little hands. Then, when he touched her hand, she grabbed his index finger and would not let go. His eyes shone and Akanishi saw it clearly because he had been staring at him the entire time.
“Can I hold her, Jin?” whispered Kamenashi, and he was looking at her like she was the most endearing creature he had ever seen.
Akanishi nodded and handed her over to him cautiously. He saw his eyes shone even more of delight and the sides of his lips curved up to form a small smile. Akanishi remembered faintly of a time when Kamenashi had looked at him the same way he was looking at his daughter at that moment, and he wondered what it meant.
She was Akanishi's precious daughter. On the day she was born, Kamenashi looked at him directly, smiled sincerely at him and even called him 'Jin' again.
She was the wicked witch that had cast a curse upon them, and she was also the good fairy that ultimately broke the evil spell.
She was Akanishi's daughter. She was Nanami.
On the day she was born, Akanishi felt like crying because of joy.
--
Some While Ago - Tiara
“I still remember the day you were born,” Kamenashi said to her one day out of the blue.
“You do?”
“Yes, you were still a little, tiny baby and Jin was carrying you in his arms in the hospital. He looked like he was the happiest person in the world.” He reminisced and smiled. Kamenashi looked at her fondly and said, nostalgically, “And now you’re turning 18. It’s been 18 years. 18 years. Time flies by so fast.”
She looked back at him and pondered about his words.
--
Today’s Now - Tiara
Kamenashi agreed to Nanami’s proposal soon afterwards. He said he was going to take responsibility no matter what happened, and thus they started dating.
Kamenashi never addressed Nanami’s father by his given name when he was speaking to her. It was always 'your father' or, when he was speaking to her mother, 'your husband.'
She noticed a habit Kamenashi had whenever they were kissing. He would brush her hair on the right side aside, and caress her face, gently touching the edge of her right eye. Every time, as if to confirm something.
She knew that he was looking for a mole, and she knew that she didn't have one.
She cast a glance at Kamenashi and saw that he looked exhausted.
“You should go to rest now,” she suggested, after they had finished dinner in a restaurant and were enjoying the rest of the red wine she had ordered. They had been dating for almost a month now.
“Nonsense, I'll take you home.”
“I can go home by myself.”
“It's already late, you shouldn't go on your own.”
“What if Papa sees us?”
Kamenashi took a sip from the wine, and then looked at her gravely.
She said, “Well, you can take me to the subway station if you insist.”
“Nanami-chan, don't you think it's about time?” Kamenashi asked.
“About time to do what?” she asked back.
“Isn’t it about time to tell your parents about us?”
“Not yet, Kazuya,” she said quietly as she got up. “Not yet.”
--
Then several days later, Akanishi approached his daughter with a solemn, almost angry, expression on his face in the living room.
“You've been going out with Kame a lot lately, haven't you?” he asked her.
“So what?” she replied, shrugging her shoulders. She didn’t like the interrogating tone of her father.
“Nanami,” Akanishi said, frowning. “Don't talk to me like that.”
Nanami grunted. “How do you know I was out with him and not with any of my friends?”
“I asked him to eat out, but he declined my invitation because he said he was going to meet you,” Akanishi said, almost gritting his teeth.
“He did? I feel honored that he thought our date was more important.”
“Date?” Akanishi growled at her. He was furious.
“Papa, just spit it out. What do you want to know?”
“I want to know what this is about!” he said, and threw the tabloid on the table.
She looked at the colored front page; saw Kamenashi and her caught during the moment they left the restaurant some days ago. On the picture, her face was hidden with a black stripe across her eyes, but people who knew her would still recognize her, as her father did. She didn't bother to read the headlines in scandalously huge type, because she could guess what they were about.
Akanishi continued, “They say that you two have been dining out or going out on numerous occasions!”
She raised an eyebrow. “You mean you actually read this article? And since when have you come to believe what was told in those tabloids? You should know better.”
“Stop beating around the bush and tell me what's going on!” Akanishi demanded heatedly.
“I've been to the hospital yesterday,” she said suddenly.
“…W-what?” Akanishi stuttered, not comprehending where she was heading.
“Papa, listen,” she drew in a deep breath, and said, “I'm pregnant.”
Nanami watched her father’s face turning pale the instant he fully grasped the indication of her confession.
“… You're joking, aren't you?” he asked his daughter.
Then Akanishi remembered that, back to years ago, he had asked Alice the same question. He also remembered that Tanaka had asked him the same question in the studio. Did he look as shocked as Tanaka looked back then? He also remembered how he had waited, waited and waited, waited until Kamenashi was gone to break the news to the others, because he didn't want to see Kamenashi's reaction, he didn't want to see him forcing himself to smile at him, as Akanishi knew he would. Just as Akanishi knew that his marriage would not make Kamenashi happy at all. But Akanishi wanted to have the security of a family, he wanted to settle down with someone he liked, and he liked Alice, indeed, but it was different, yes, different than what he felt for Kamenashi, but he still chose her. He would have given up everything to be with Kamenashi, he could have refused Alice easily, and yet, he had no other choice because there was... Nanami.
And Akanishi reached his limits.
“Why do you keep doing this?” He exploded. “WHY DO YOU KEEP DOING THIS?”
“I don't think I understand, Papa,” Nanami said, taken aback by her father’s sudden outburst.
“What's going on?” Alice came out of the kitchen with a face that reflected all her worries. “Why are you screaming like that, Jin?”
“IT'S ALWAYS BEEN YOU! YOU HAVE ALWAYS BEEN TEARING US APART. BACK THEN, YEARS AGO, AND EVEN NOW! WHY?”
Nanami took in a deep breath. “Why are you telling me such nonsense instead of telling me off like any other father would? Why are you not freaking out like any other father would and accuse me like any other father would? Oh yeah, right, you're not like any other father.”
“What-” Akanishi looked at his daughter, confused.
Nanami drew in a deep breath. “But tell me, why do you sound so jealous?”
“Nanami-chan...?” Alice began worriedly.
“You're jealous of me,” she said to her father determinedly. “Why? Is it because I'm a girl? Is it because I can call him by his given name without having to be concerned about anything?”
Akanishi said, “Nanami, you-”
“… Because I can tell him that I love him and that I want to marry him - but you can't? Not back then, not now. Never,” She said, her voice trembling like her entire body did, and tears threatened leave her eyes, soon, very soon. She held her head up high to prevent her tears from falling out of the corner of her eyes.
I can't back down and cry now, she thought, but in the end she couldn't help it. Not after her father had slapped her for the first time in her life.
--
Akanishi stormed Kamenashi’s apartment without warning and surprised its owner tremendously. Kamenashi didn’t have time to prepare himself to face Akanishi’s rage, and just when he was wondering how Akanishi was able to open the apartment door, he remembered that Akanishi knew where he hid the spare key.
“It's your fault! It's all your fault! How could you have done that? How could you do that to me!” Akanishi yelled at Kamenashi without closing the front door.
“Jin, calm down,” Kamenashi said.
“IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT!” Akanishi yelled, and grabbed his shoulders.
“What are you talking about-”
“About you and Nanami! That's what I'm talking about!”
“Jin, Jin. Stop. Don't scream like that. The neighbors...” Kamenashi tried to remind him.
“I don't care about your fucking neighbors!” Jin cried, forcing his way all inside the apartment and slamming the door behind him.
--
Back Then - Jin and Kame
Back in the days when they were still young, back when they were still boys, life seemed so easy. Although they knew deep, deep down that life really wasn't that easy at all. But back then they were young.
Kamenashi still remembered the scent of the hot summer evening in the city. The innocent sound of laughter, the fun they had when work was finally over.
In the brief moment of joy he forgot everything around him, and before he knew it he had kissed Akanishi.
He didn’t think much about it, he didn’t even grasp what he had done, and he was still smiling until he saw Akanishi's widened eyes. He hadn’t meant it to be like that. He just got carried away by the moment.
Then he saw Akanishi blushing and he started blushing, too. Or did he start blushing first, and then saw that Akanishi was blushing? It didn't matter. The thrilling sensation he felt when Akanishi kissed him back was more unforgettable.
They were too young back then.
They believed that, perhaps, there would be a chance for them. They didn’t know about the price they would have to pay to be with the other.
--
The first time they went all the way was awkward and sticky. None of them really remembered when and where they did it, but they did it.
Thinking back, Kamenashi thought it was ridiculous that they decided who was going to top by playing rock-paper-scissors. Kamenashi could have smacked himself for forgetting that Akanishi was very lucky when it came to games like that.
Akanishi might be good in rock-paper-scissors, but he wasn’t very good in bed for the first time.
Consequently, the first coherent sentence Akanishi uttered after ejaculation was an apology to Kame.
Kamenashi’s first response consisted of a curse. “I'm never going to do it again! Never. Never. Never!” Kamenashi declared, hiding his face with his hands.
“Kame, I'm so sorry...” Akanishi repeated sincerely and kissed Kamenashi’s hands gently.
“Didn't it hurt you, too?” Kamenashi asked, peeking at Akanishi through his fingers.
“It did. At first... But then it started feeling good and, er...”
Kamenashi's face flushed with Akanishi's at the same time, and to break the awkward moment that had emerged he murmured, “It really hurt.”
“Well, we can improve next time...” Akanishi suggested.
“There won't be a next time! No way! I'm not going to do it ever again!” Kamenashi yelled, turning around and digging his head into the pillow.
“Then... I could be bottom next time.”
Kamenashi turned his head back to Akanishi and looked at him incredulously.
“Not okay?” Akanishi asked weakly.
“Jin, are you M?” Kamenashi asked, frowning.
“Hah? I was trying to be nice and that’s your response?” Akanishi exclaimed, outraged.
“Well... I was just talking about how much it hurt and then you tell me that you want to be bottom...” Kamenashi sighed.
“But, Kame, I love you, and I want to have sex with you!” Akanishi said sincerely.
“Ew, stop it!” Kamenashi demanded loudly. “I don't need this kind of love declaration! This is so disgusting!”
“This is so not disgusting!”
“You are disgusting!”
“No way!”
“Yes way! Ouch, ouch, ouch! Jin, it hurts!”
“Oh, I'm sorry!”
They argued about more useless things. Then they laughed and kissed. Then they drifted to sleep in each other’s arms. And they were happy. Back then.
--
Today’s Now - Jin and Kame
After waking up from a brief nap, Kamenashi found himself on his bed, and Akanishi languidly sitting beside him, smoking with the ashtray in his hand. Akanishi’s upper body was exposed to the dim moonlight through the window. The scent of sex filled the room along with the one from Akanishi’s favorite cigarette.
That part of Kamenashi’s body felt like it was burning. It was as if he could still feel Akanishi inside him, and the memory of the sensation made him shudder. It’s been so long since last time.
Kamenashi’s body was aching all over when he tried to get up. He was getting old, he thought sulkily.
Akanishi turned to look at Kamenashi, and offered the rest of his cigarette to him. Kamenashi took it immediately. Then Akanishi also handed him the ashtray wordlessly.
Akanishi watched him smoke in silence, and then asked all of a sudden, “Do you love her?”
Kamenashi had asked him the same question long time ago. Now their roles reversed, and Akanishi wondered whether Kamenashi had been as nervous when he had been waiting for his answer.
“I love her,” Kamenashi said without hesitation.
Akanishi’s body trembled slightly. He had been expecting it, but it still hurt to hear the answer. Did Kamenashi feel the same way back then?
“Kazu... Why did you choose her?” Akanishi asked resentfully. He wanted to know. He really wanted to know.
“I love her,” Kamenashi said, and extinguished the cigarette on the ashtray. “But only as your child.”
Akanishi looked at him, startled. “But then… why did you… and Nanami…?”
“To be honest,” Kamenashi said slowly. “I don’t think I ever slept with her. I woke up with her in the same hotel room one night, and she said we did it the night before, but I don’t think it’s true. When she told me that she was grinning like she always does when she’s pulling pranks on someone.”
“But she said she was pregnant!”
“She is pregnant?” Kamenashi asked in astonishment.
“You didn’t know that?”
“No!”
“Maybe she was about to tell you, but then I confronted her and she blurted it out to me first.”
“…”
“But, Kazu, this means that you actually slept with her, you bastard!”
“Who are you calling a bastard!” Kamenashi exclaimed angrily.
“Damn it!” Akanishi ruffled through his hair in frustration. “Kazu, you’re like 20 years older than her! And if you marry Nanami you’ll be my son in law. This is so fucked up!”
“Who said I was going to marry her?” Kamenashi frowned.
“But you… you and her, you two did…” Akanishi stuttered, and was suddenly having a hard time to express his words.
Kamenashi bit his lip. “I said I didn’t.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“So you won’t marry Nanami?”
“I didn’t say that. If I- Woah, what are you doing!” Kamenashi began, but when Akanishi threw his whole weight upon him he ended his sentence in an irritated cry.
“Kazu!” Akanishi said. His eyes were shining. “Kazu, I’m so happy that you won’t become my son-in-law.”
Kamenashi tried to free himself from Akanishi’s grip, in vain, and looked at him wordlessly.
“Don’t marry her,” Akanishi said finally.
Kamenashi didn’t respond, instead he slightly pushed Akanishi away and proceeded to get up from bed.
Akanishi almost panicked. He held back Kamenashi by his arm, and said hastily, “Kame, I want to be with you. I really do.”
“Jin. You’re so selfish.”
“I know that. But I can’t help it.”
“You can't leave Alice,” Kamenashi said definitely. “She needs you. She has no one to take care of her but you.”
“What about you?” Jin asked softly. “Do you have anyone to take care of you?”
“I can take care of myself.”
“No, you can't. You've never succeeded. You've always needed others to care for you, to worry about you, to watch out for you... Kazu, you need me just as much as Alice does.”
“Jin, I don’t need you,” Kamenashi said, his words almost a whisper. “Don’t compare me to your wife.”
“No, Kazu. I’m not. I just want to take care of you. I want you to be the one I can take care of.” Akanishi paused, and then said, “Kazu, I love you.”
Kamenashi asked then, “If you love me, why did you marry Alice?”
After a while, Akanishi confessed, “You've been drifting away from me. I was afraid. I wanted to take care of you, I liked to think that you needed me, but then you didn't need me anymore. I just wanted someone... someone who was dependent on me.”
“Jin, I know. I understand. I've always known,” Kamenashi said. “Jin, you're a very gentle person, who can’t get by on your own. I know. That’s one of the reasons why I love you.”
Kamenashi smiled slightly at him. Akanishi thought that he had not seen him smiling like that in a long while, and at the same time he wished that he could see him smiling like that more often.
Kamenashi said, “So about Nanami-chan and me. Do you believe me?”
“Of course I do! I know that you would never sleep with a woman. Not even if she looks a lot like me.”
Kamenashi kicked Akanishi on the side. “Idiot!”
Akanishi giggled. Then he said suddenly, “It's like I'm having an affair with you.”
“Jin, it's not like you're having an affair with you, you are having an affair with me.” Kamenashi sighed.
Akanishi chuckled some more and held Kamenashi closer to him.
“Kazu…” he whispered. “… I have lived together with Alice for 18 years. We’ve been through good times and bad times. We raised up Nanami together. We did so many things together. I’d have to lie if I said I didn’t have feelings for her or didn’t feel guilty about anything. I’d like to make up for every bad thing I’ve done to her. But I don’t know how…”
Kamenashi listened in silence.
“I don’t know how I could ever make up to her and Nanami for my selfishness. Even after 18 years, I still want to be with you, Kazu.”
“Jin,” Kame said, and he looked tired, very tired; tired and sad, “We're not teenagers anymore, Jin.”
“But we can pretend, can’t we?” Akanishi said.
Then he leaned in and kissed Kamenashi. When Kamenashi didn’t fight back and on its instead returned the kiss, Akanishi was overjoyed.
The sun was rising. Night would become day, and this night would fade away and become another day. They would return to their actual life and they would still have to say good-bye.
--
Today’s Now - Alice
Alice had always been waiting for Akanishi for as long as she remembered.
She never thought much about Akanishi before she met him; frankly speaking she’d never been much of a Johnny’s fan. But she knew about KAT-TUN and Akanishi Jin because her best friend was part of Akanishi’s huge circle of friends.
It was also thanks to her friend that she got to know Akanishi. Alice’s first impression of him was that he was a very handsome and funny guy, but no more than that. Indeed, she looked forward to see him again, but she didn’t give it much a thought.
She realized that she fell in love with him on their fifth meeting.
They sat next to each other in the nightclub Akanishi regularly frequented; they were enjoying their drinks and making random comments about the music choice of the DJ.
“You remind me of someone,” Akanishi said suddenly. “I don’t know why, maybe it’s your eyes, I don’t know, but you remind me of someone.”
She looked at him questioningly, and she saw the forlorn and abandoned expression on his face in the wild and colorful lights of the dark nightclub.
She fell in love with a man who was heart-broken, and she wanted to save him.
After meeting Kamenashi, Alice realized from the way Akanishi behaved around him that the someone Akanishi was talking about was, without a doubt, Kamenashi Kazuya.
She was all that Kamenashi wasn’t anymore, and she thought that was the way things were supposed to be.
So Alice waited for Akanishi.
She didn’t have to wait too long for their first kiss and their first date. But she had to wait a lot longer to take their relationship a step further.
Then it almost took all of her patience before he agreed to marry her.
After the marriage, she believed she wouldn’t have to wait for Akanishi anymore.
She was wrong. She was still waiting for him. Waiting for him to settle his eyes on her.
A little longer, just a little bit longer, she told herself over and over again.
But when Akanishi didn’t return home the night when their pregnant daughter cried herself to sleep, Alice thought, perhaps it was time to give up waiting.
--
Today’s Now - Tiara
Sometimes, life takes turns when you least expect it.
That was what Kamenashi thought when he received a message from Nanami three weeks later.
She asked whether he had time for a meeting before she became too busy with moving to a new apartment with her boyfriend, who was going to become her husband in the near future.
Kamenashi wrote back to her straight away and arranged a meeting.
She waved at him, when she spotted him through the huge window of the café. It was when Kamenashi noticed that she wasn’t a little girl anymore. She was indeed a grown-up woman, who was soon going to be a mother.
“Is everything going well?” Kamenashi asked, as he sat down opposite of her.
“Yes, it is. My boyfriend found a nice apartment. It's not as cheap as the other one that we also had in consideration but it had a bigger bathroom and was closer to the inner city.”
“Do you need any help with moving? If you do just tell me.”
“Oh no, not at all, don't worry, Kazuya.”
“Why did you call me here?”
“… I want to apologize,” she said, “because I lied to you to make you date me, and maybe eventually marry me.”
“Why did you do all that?” Kamenashi asked. “Your true motive is not because you love me and want to marry me, is it?”
“Let me tell you something,” she said slowly, and sipped on her coffee.
Then she began, “Once there was a family. There was a father, a mother and a little girl. I was the little girl. It was my family. It was my happy family. I wanted my family to stay the way it has always been, but what I wanted has only remained the same on its surface. It has began to rot on the inside, in places I didn't look, couldn't see.”
She paused. “It's like a house made of wood. Nobody knew it had a woodboring beetle's egg laid in it. It was a small egg that grew and turned into a larva that began to consume the wood from the inside. From time to time the traces of the destruction process could be viewed from the outside, but they were so tiny and seemed so insignificant that they were merely ignored, brushed aside and finally forgotten. The larva ate the wood until nothing was left inside, it grew into an adult insect and flew away, leaving the wood, empty as it was, and it was only shortly afterwards that the whole house collapsed. I didn't want this to happen to my house, you know?”
“I know,” Kamenashi simply said.
“I was hoping they wouldn't divorce. Now I'm not sure anymore,” she said. “I was tired of the way things went. Everything was blurry and none of you would step up and settle things. At first, I didn't want you to break up Papa and Mama. I was afraid that you and Papa would catch each other's eyes and recognize the feelings you had for each other one day and then Papa would leave Mama. I didn't want it to happen, so I tried to get your attention, to make you turn your attention to me and to make you forget about Papa, and choose me instead. I thought I could do that. I noticed that you were seeing me as a link to papa, to keep being close to him, you were using me and I used you.”
She paused again and lit a cigarette before continuing. “But in the end I failed. I failed terribly. I thought I was winning, but then I realized: Papa has been thinking about me the same way. He loved me because I was the one keeping you two together. Mama probably thinks the same. I'm her connection to Papa. Without me he wouldn't have married her in the first place. Do you know what Papa told me when I asked her why he married Mama? He said 'Because she had you.' Because she had me. Not because he loved her? He would never have married her had I not been there? In the end, you all didn't love me as much as you did to the person I was connecting you to. After all I'm no more than a mere shadow of my father…”
Kamenashi interrupted immediately, “That's not true, Nanami-chan, you know that's not true...”
Nanami contradicted cynically, “What is not true? Even if I really carried your child you would not marry me, not as long as Papa didn’t agree. Kazuya, whenever it involves love, you've always been Papa's captive and always will be.”
Kamenashi opened his mouth, wanting to say something in return, but no words would leave him.
“Also, one of my major miscalculation was that you both knew about your feelings from begin on. What I did just brought you two closer, didn’t it?” she said bitterly. “And I'm a terrible story-teller, aren't I?”
“No, you’re not,” Kamenashi said immediately. “And believe me when I say this, we all love you dearly for who you are, and not who you connect us to.”
Nanami closed her eyes and said with a little smile, “Thank you.”
Kamenashi smiled, too. “So I'm a woodboring beetle in your eyes?”
Nanami chuckled and opened her eyes. “No, you're the most handsome woodboring beetle in my eyes.”
“Big difference,” Kamenashi grumbled. Then he added, “But I'd never leave your family. I’m serious.”
“You mean, you'd never leave Papa,” she corrected.
They sat at the table silently for a while.
“Your boyfriend. Is he treating you well?”
“Yes,” she said, and smiled. “I can tell that he really loves me for who I am.”
”Do you love him?” Kamenashi asked at last.
“I do,” she said, and stubbed out the cigarette. “But Kazuya...”
“Yes?”
“Most of the time you don't end up marrying the one you love most,” she said.
Kamenashi didn’t say anything as response.
“I'm like Papa after all,” she said with a sigh. “Well, compared to you, my child's father is a much better match for me. It’s true. Everything will somehow work out in the end. So don’t worry.”
They left the café after Nanami had finished her cup of coffee. Kamenashi insisted upon paying the bill although Nanami said it was supposed to be her treat. Then he offered her a ride, which she declined.
They parted with Nanami’s promise that she’d call Kamenashi again once she’d settled down in her new home.
Kamenashi climbed into his car with a heavy heart, thinking back about the conversation he had had with Nanami.
Then his cell phone started ringing.
Kamenashi couldn’t help but smile upon seeing that the call was from Akanishi Jin.
--
Today’s Now - Jin and Kame
“Kazu,” Akanishi said, setting the tabloid he was reading aside.
“Yes?” Kamenashi answered, after quickly stealing a glance at the headlines top of a huge picture of Akanishi from their latest photoshoot along with a picture of Alice and Nanami, before Akanishi tossed it away completely and hid it from his view.
“Will you hold my hand now?” Akanishi asked.
“Sure,” Kamenashi answered without hesitation, and reached out for Akanishi’s hand.
Kamenashi smiled at Akanishi, who smiled back faintly, but gladly in return, and tightened his hold on his hand.
- We're not teenagers anymore, Jin. We're not young enough anymore to afford the price we have to pay.
- But we can still pretend, can't we?
The End
A/A/N: Some image songs!
Words That We Couldn't Say: Song by Kanno Yohko/The Seatbelts, included in Cowboy Bebop Blue, the third Cowboy Bebop soundtrack album. mediafire
Patience: To me, this songs describes Jin and Alice's relationship very well. By Take That, included in the single with the same name and the album Beautiful World. mediafire
I actually started writing this fic... in the summer of last year. I think. I completely stopped writing it after realizing that it was a fic full of my squicks. LOL! But after reading the script I had at that time again, I decided to finish it after all. It was quite challenging. I mean, I wrote my own squick fic! (But there's no character death, don't worry. XD)
This fic might be a little too dark for the general Christmas mood? Hm. Maa maa.
Anyway, now I have to go and see my sister's Christmas musical!
Bye for now. ♥
*Sorry for the HTML errors. Fixed now. -_-;;
Title: Words That We Couldn't Say
Fandom: Johnny's Entertainment
Characters: Akame, Jin/OC, Kame/OC
Theme: #30 - Love
Rating: PG-13
Genre: future AU, slash, het, mild angst
Summary: We're not teenagers anymore, Jin. We're not young enough anymore to afford the price we have to pay.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything but the plot and the OCs, I guess.
A/N: This fic is "unclassified, open-end, in-between", according to takagi, who was so kind to beta the fic (twice ^^;;) for me. I believe she's correct, so please proceed at own risk. Abuse of italics. Oh, I forgot, I'm dedicating this fic to takagi because I owe her. LOL.
Word Count: 9,435
Words That We Couldn’t Say
- We're not teenagers anymore, Jin. We're not young enough anymore to afford the price we have to pay.
- But we can still pretend, can't we?
Back Then - Kame
They were young at that time.
The sun that had shone mercilessly upon them during the day had long disappeared and the sickle moon had become its replacement, but even the faint moonlight was hidden behind blocks of heavy clouds, forging pitch darkness at the instant. The temperature dropped considerably, but it was still uncomfortably hot as the boy felt the slick fabric of his sleeping bag glued to his sweating body. Not to mention the mosquitoes that were equally annoying. The jumbling noises by day had perished from the beach. The only sounds left were the periodic roar of the ocean and the calm breathing of his best friend next to him, sound asleep.
He couldn't sleep despite the tiring day they had to endure. He could tell that his friend had been in a bad mood since midday. It wasn't hard to tell since his friend didn't exactly hold back voicing out his utter discontentment. But he, on the other hand, couldn't complain like his friend had been doing, not in front of the rolling camera.
When he turned his head slightly to the right he was not surprised that he wasn't able to even make out the silhouette of the other at all. He couldn't see him although they were so close, so very close.
It was a bit frightening. He knew that his eyes were open, but no matter how hard he tried to glimpse or to blink, he couldn't see anything beside darkness and more darkness. It was as if he had turned blind, as if he had been trapped in an empty and black vacuum with no way out. Somewhere deep inside he had the burning urge to call out to his friend, wake him up and be relieved to hear a muffled and annoyed voice as response.
But he didn't do it.
It was a bit frightening, but he wasn't really afraid.
He wasn't really afraid because although he couldn’t see him, he could hear his breathing, and he knew that he was there.
He was sure that, back then, they had been there. Together.
--
Today's Now - Kame
Kamenashi woke up slowly from the dream that was more a memory - a memory that always puts a smile on his face. He took down his arm, which he had used to cover his eyes, and blinked. He stared blankly at the white ceiling, and noticed that something was off.
For one, he was staring at a very unfamiliar white ceiling. Secondly, the bed sheet felt different than the ones he used at home and he noted that he was wearing a bathrobe instead of the usual pajama he would put on to sleep. His whole body felt sticky and awkward, he must have sweat a lot despite the moderate, if not a bit too cold, temperature in the room.
It took him a while to fully wake up and then it took him some more time to adjust his mind to his surroundings.
The light in the room was dim. He shifted his eyes to the left to see an air-conditioner and the few strings attached to it moving along with the cold air blown into the room. Below was a big black television on a dark varnished wooden commode. The room was dominated by yellow-tinged black and dull white colors only; black furniture, black television, but white walls, floor and white sheets - all evoking a strange visual feeling as if he was in midst of an old washed-out photography from his grandparents' generation.
In daze, he returned his gaze to the ceiling again. Kamenashi concluded that he must be in a hotel room. He just couldn't remember how he got to a hotel room last night to save his life.
Everything was plain and unfamiliar; however, there was the indistinct smell of a cigarette brand he knew well lingering in the air, and it made him feel fidgety.
He turned his head to the right; saw the rest of the room, the black couch, and her.
He was with her? Kamenashi thought. What happened last night? Last night he went home right after work, and then she called, they met up and then...
“Sorry, did I wake you up?” she asked from not afar.
He saw her dropping ashes in the glass ashtray, getting up from the couch with a smile and skipping closer to him. He sat up on the bed hesitantly.
“When have you started smoking?” Kamenashi asked, as it was the first thing that came to his mind after he had straightened himself.
“Don’t even start. You smoke, too,” she said, rolling her eyes.
He frowned and reached out to snatch the cigarette away from her, but she ducked away just in time.
“Nanami-chan,” Kamenashi said firmly. “I was asking you when you had started smoking.”
She clicked her tongue loudly. “Stop acting like you're my dad. You're not, although you're old enough to have a daughter my age,” she pointed out.
“Nanami-chan, answer my question!” Kamenashi insisted sternly, giving her one of those intimidating glares he was well-known for. Nanami laughed lightly in response as she blew out a cloud of cigarette smoke which dissipated into the air slowly.
“Geez,” she said after taking another draw, “... I don't know. I probably started after my first boyfriend dumped me. Papa said smoking was stress relieving. So I tried, it worked well, I didn't quit. Whole story.”
“I should have known that you got it from him,” Kamenashi said with a sigh. Then upon fully digesting her words, he added, “Wait. First boyfriend? Why have I never heard about you dating any boys before?”
“Do you really believe I've never been dating before?” she laughed. “Sure, I never told you all because if I had done so Papa would have scared away every single one of them, wouldn't he?”
Kamenashi laughed quietly.
“This is not funny, Kazuya,” she said and crossed her arms.
“... Since when have we become on first name basis?” he asked her, obviously startled.
“You're terrible!” she exclaimed with an austere frown. “After all that happened last night!”
“Last night?” he asked.
“Last night,” she answered, and nodded her head.
He looked at her.
“No way,” Kamenashi spurted finally. “No way, no way! I would never lay a hand on you, I-”
She just looked back at him, wearing an amused expression on her face.
--
Kamenashi, who was fully dressed by then, walked around the couch nervously. He stopped there and then, muttering inaudibly to himself and stomping loudly with his feet occasionally.
“Could you please stop doing that? It's irritating,” Nanami complained after a while.
Kamenashi swung around to look at her.
“Do you even understand the possible consequences of last night?” he said, gritting his teeth.
“I do. We spent a night together. What’s the big deal?”
“What's the big deal? Nanami-chan, you're still a child...” Kamenashi began.
“I'm eighteen now! Do you still call me a child?” she cut him off angrily.
“Yes, eighteen, you're only eighteen! There's a gap of two decades between us! Oh, what have I done?!”
She didn't say anything in return.
“What should we do now?” Kamenashi exclaimed.
“We could start dating,” she said. “As a start.”
“Are you serious?” Kamenashi asked her incredulously.
“Do I look like I'm joking?”
“... If your dad finds out about it…” Kamenashi groaned. His headache was getting worse with each passing second, especially after being informed that she had put something in his drink without him noticing last night. “... he'll kill me.”
“No,” she disagreed quietly. “Papa will kill me.”
“What are you talking about, young lady.” Kamenashi turned towards her, but he couldn't see her face.
“I’m saying the truth,” she said.
“No, Jin would never harm a hair on your head,” he said.
--
Years Ago, On Screen - KAT-TUN
“It was directly after the filming for 24 Hour TV. It was in 2006. We were getting ready to leave, ah, Kamenashi already left before us because he had a meeting for his drama, right?” Nakamaru recalled, pausing a little to look at Kamenashi. Kamenashi nodded his head slightly as confirmation, then Nakamaru continued, “So we were getting ready to leave and then Akanishi said, 'Wait a minute, I have something to tell you.' Then he said bluntly, 'I'm going to marry.' Like that.”
“Really, just like that?” said the female announcer in disbelief.
“Yes, word by word. Isn't it unbelievable?” Nakamaru grimaced at Akanishi who tilted his head and looked half embarrassed, half amused. “He came out with the news just like that! It wasn't a question or anything, it was a definite statement. They've already arranged the date of the wedding by the time he told us!”
“That must have been a shock.”
“It was! I thought he was joking at first. We all did. We've never even heard him mentioning Alice-san before, not even once, and suddenly he's telling us that he’s going to marry her! Of course you'd think he’s joking, wouldn't you? But he wasn't joking. Akanishi was serious.”
“How did you all react to the news that time?” she asked, turning to look at the rest of KAT-TUN.
Tanaka said, “I asked him whether he was joking at first as well. When he said he wasn't, I started yelling at him-”
“I remember,” Taguchi interrupted with the usual huge smile on his face and pointed at Tanaka. “You almost punched him in the face, but Ueda held you back and you got angry at Ueda and started fighting with him.”
A wild chorus of “Yes, he did, he did!” erupted immediately after Taguchi's comment.
“Really?” the announcer said. “You had a fight?”
Ueda let out a short laugh. “We thought we have gotten over the age of fighting, but it all came back to us in an instant. However, it wasn't as serious as it sounds...”
“But! I was really mad at Akanishi back then!” Tanaka confessed. “The anger just rushed to my head and I lost control of my fist.”
“I've always wanted to ask you...” Akanishi said to Tanaka. “Why did you get so mad at me?”
Tanaka wanted to protest, but Akanishi carried on without waiting.
“See, the others didn't get mad at me at all, but you - you didn't even attend my wedding! (A background chorus of “Ehhh!” erupted from the audience, even louder than before.) Everyone else went,” Akanishi complained with a laugh and started counting names with his fingers. “Ueda, Kamenashi, Taguchi and Nakamaru. Everyone from KAT-TUN went, only you didn't.”
“That's because I was mad at you!” Tanaka said loudly, and everyone began to laugh.
“See, I'm asking you why...” Akanishi insisted with an amused smile.
“I was just mad, okay? You got a problem with that!?” Tanaka yelled.
“Don't fight again!” Nakamaru said, and gestured them to calm down.
The 'fight' ended with laughter once again.
“Kamenashi-san, you weren't present to hear Akanishi's news at first, were you?” The interviewer turned her attention to Kamenashi. “How did you get to know about it?”
“Well, as for me... That's actually a funny story. I heard it from Ueda, not from Akanishi, mind you, and...” Kamenashi told the same story as he had told in many TV programs, and the press conference, before again.
He would tell it again in the next show and he would tell it again and again. A nice story about Ueda calling him, him calling Akanishi immediately afterwards and having a serious discussion with him, and so on. The audience never seemed to get tired of hearing about it.
Akanishi switched the microphone he was holding to the other hand and rubbed his nose lightly with his thumb. He stared blankly at the small video screen in front of him as the camera zoomed in on Kamenashi's concentrated face.
--
Years Ago, Off Screen - Jin
“Does Kame already know?” Ueda asked, leaning onto the raw concrete wall in the underground parking lot of the studio. The place seemed extraordinarily quiet in contrast to the scene inside the studio after Akanishi's sudden marriage announcement and after Tanaka had stomped off wearing an expression as if the whole world had turned against him.
Akanishi just stood beside him with the burning cigarette in his hand and didn't even register the question directed at him for a while. He was still in daze because of what Tanaka had screamed at him.
What about Kame, he had asked him. What about Kame?
Then Akanishi shook his head.
“No, I haven't told him yet,” he confessed silently, almost timidly.
“Then you should speak to him, Jin,” Ueda said.
“I will,” Akanishi said. He leaned his head back against the wall with a heavy sigh, and murmured, “I will.”
--
In the end Kamenashi was the one to approach him about the matter with a phone call.
“Kame?” Akanishi said after finally deciding to pick up the cell phone. He licked his lips nervously. He was awaiting an outburst of anger. (“What the fuck do you think you're doing, Akanishi Jin?” or “I can't believe you're doing this to us; to KAT-TUN, to me!”)
But all Kamenashi said was simply, “Jin.”
“Y-Yes?”
“I've already heard about it. From Ueda.”
“... You did.”
“I did.”
“So,” Jin started.
“Are you trying to be like Matsubara-san?” Kame said mockingly, however, it sounded faked to Akanishi. Kamenashi kept on talking, his voice decreased in volume, which turned into a whisper in the end, and Akanishi had troubles to fully understand him.
But he did hear him say, “Did Johnny-san ask you, 'You. It's either your work or your woman. Pick your choice!' and you said, 'My woman.' … Did it happen like that?”
“No,” Jin denied at last. “I asked whether I could keep my job, being part of KAT-TUN, and still marry, and I was told that I could. I'm going to continue work and also marry her. I'm not quitting, I don't have to. I guess the times have changed, Kame.”
“I see.”
“Kame,” Akanishi started cautiously, “if you told me not to...”
“Jin, she's pregnant,” Kamenashi interrupted harshly. “Whatever you are about to suggest, you can't do it. You can't do it to her. If you don't marry her you'll ruin her whole career, her whole life, because she's going to keep the baby, because it's your child, because she loves you. You can't do it to her!”
“I know, I know,” Akanishi said hurriedly. He shouldn’t even have thought about it, he knew that. But he really wanted to find another way with Kamenashi. It was impossible, wasn’t it?
“Do you love her?” Kamenashi interrupted again all of a sudden.
“Kame…”
“Well?”
Akanishi hesitated. “I think I do. Yes, I do.”
The person on the other side of the line fell silent. Just when Akanishi was wondering whether Kamenashi was still present on the other side, he heard a sigh. A sigh that sounded somewhat final.
“Then it's all right.” He heard him say.
After biding a brief goodbye, Kamenashi hung up on him.
Akanishi didn't know why, but he was disappointed, in a way, and scared.
Kamenashi had been calm during the entire conversation, and he had approved of his marriage in the end. He didn't get angry or shout at him. Akanishi had expected something alike to happen, having known Kamenashi, as blunt as he could be at times, for so long after all. But none of the things he had imagined and played out in his mind happened.
Kamenashi had been calm and he had been talking to him as if... as if they had been talking about an upcoming project.
That attitude scared Akanishi more than anything else.
--
Kamenashi arrived belatedly to the wedding. The rest of his family, who had all been invited, was already seated in the second front row. From behind the scene, Akanishi saw how embarrassed Kamenashi was as he was already late, and, in addition to that, had to pass all the rows, enduring the looks of the whole audience flashed at him before finally getting to his seat. Kamenashi had barely sat down next to his mother when Akanishi walked in.
Akanishi had been secretly wishing for something unexpected to happen. Something so cheesy that he's only seen it happening in old movies Kamenashi liked to watch. Akanishi remembered how Kamenashi would always cry his eyes out while he took the chance to make fun of him. Those times seemed so long ago.
He was hoping for things to happen, yet, he knew that nothing was ever going to happen the moment he saw Kamenashi standing up to give the speech, wearing a white suit and a smile so bright it hurt his eyes.
When their eyes crossed, Akanishi saw Kamenashi's smile growing wider, but he couldn't smile back at him.
--
Years Ago, Off Screen - Kame
It was a well-known fact that out of all of KAT-TUN, Tanaka was the only one who had refused to attend Akanishi's wedding.
In fact, it was a lie, since Tanaka did go to Akanishi's wedding but just didn't go inside the ceremony hall.
Kamenashi saw Tanaka standing outside, all dressed up in a suit. Tanaka even took out the bizarre hair extensions he had lately for the occasion. Kamenashi closed the door of his car and stepped slowly towards him.
“You're late,” Kamenashi remarked.
“So are you,” was Tanaka’s reply.
“True.”
They fell silent for a while.
“Aren't you supposed to give the speech?” Tanaka broke the silence first.
“Yes,” Kamenashi answered.
“Heard it from Yuichi,” Tanaka added.
“I see,” said Kamenashi.
“Maybe you should go inside now.” Tanaka nodded towards the entrance, and kicked a small pebble stone on the ground.
“Yes, I should,” Kamenashi said. “Are you coming, too?”
Tanaka didn't answer, instead he said, “I'm worried about you.”
“Why should you be worried?” Kamenashi smiled. “There's nothing to be worried about.”
“Fuck you!” Tanaka snapped. “Why are both of you acting like that! Do you really think we haven't noticed anything? Fine, I’m not going to care anymore!”
Tanaka went away in fury, leaving Kamenashi feeling even more lost than he did before.
Kamenashi tightened his fist until his knuckles began to turn white. He tried to even out his breathing, succeeded somewhat, and then stepped forward without hesitation.
--
Some While Ago - Tiara
“You and Mama are alike,” Nanami told him once; when she was still younger; when he was still younger and still uncertain about various things.
Kamenashi had just come back from Hokkaido after filming and he went to visit the Akanishi family spontaneously. But on his arrival, neither of the parents was at home. Nanami informed him that they would come back in about an hour after calling them and they asked him to stay until then. She suggested playing a board game to kill time until they returned, and he agreed.
She drew the comparison to them in the middle of the game all of a sudden.
“We are alike?” he asked, raising his eyebrows.
“Yes.” She nodded, still looking at the game board.
“We don't look alike, and our personalities are very different as well.”
“I'm aware of that,” she responded.
“Then what makes us alike in your eyes?”
Nanami looked up at him briefly, and said, “The way you look at Papa.”
She threw the dice, got doublets and bore off several of Kamenashi's checkers.
--
You look just like your father, everyone who knew her father said so.
She looked a lot like her father, and yet she wasn't Akanishi Jin.
There were people that were really nice to her because they liked her father. Equally, there were people that hated her before even knowing her because of her father. The same thing applied to her mother as well, it just didn't occur as often as in the case of her father.
Her childhood was not as pleasant and carefree as she would have liked. She was the child of two idols, her father was a Johnny’s and her mother was a popular fashion model. Her father was always away, busy with work, like many other fathers she knew. But he could never easily take off a day of work to attend her school events, celebrate her birthday with her like the other fathers could.
Somehow, she had the feeling that she had always been on her own. She thought it was okay. She thought she could deal with it. At least she still had her family and people who truly loved her.
Nonetheless, the teasing from the other kids was worse. Like when they teased her with old videos of her father doing very indecent things. She was a little girl and didn't understand what was so bad about her father dancing and singing, but she got mad about the way they talked about her father. Many times did she get mad, but she never fought with them because Kame told her that a princess would never fight with others.
Then later, she grew older, and the things that had made her angry as child turned into things that she liked to watch for her own amusement. Her father didn't like to show her the old recordings of his young idol days. But her grandmother had kept a lot of them, and she watched them whenever she found free time and visited her grandparents. It was like watching a documentary of her father's teenagehood to his adulthood. Not only her father but also the other good friends of her father, like Uncle Yamashita, Uncle Nishikido, etc.
Anyway, she watched the videos primarily for Kamenashi. She found out that Kamenashi hadn't always been the way she knew him. He had been a boy at once, a shy one. Her father, too. Once, they had all been young. Younger than her, as young as she was, then older than her, and then much older than her.
Nanami often thought about Kamenashi, and what he meant to her.
He was her favorite person besides her parents. Kamenashi was as kind to her as he was strict. She totally considered him to be part of her family, and she was happy that Kamenashi looked very happy when she told him she felt that way.
But sometimes, she thought that something was off-balance. She couldn’t depict what was bothering her. She simply noticed an imbalance within her family at times.
Then, the older she grew, the more she saw, the more she understood. For instance her mother's uneasiness whenever Kamenashi visited them. The awkwardness after he had withdrawn his hands before touching her father. The indescribable look her father would give him from time to time.
The hands.
The looks.
The words. “Jin, have you ever thought about me?”
Then there was the kiss.
Perhaps it would be wrong to call it a kiss. It was almost a kiss.
An almost-kiss that never happened, never could have happened. An almost-kiss that she pretended she had never witnessed.
But she couldn’t forget her father’s doting expression he would show to Kamenashi. He would stare at Kamenashi wearing that expression whenever he thought no one was looking his way. Why was her father like that?
She didn’t understand. But she came to a decision that day.
--
“Jin,” Alice said one night.
“What?” Akanishi grumbled sleepily.
“It's about Nanami-chan.”
“What?”
“I don't know how to put it, but,” Alice said, “she seems to be hiding something.”
“Really?”
“She's trying to hide something from us.”
“That's alright, isn't it? Who hasn't tried to hide something from their parents?”
“But it seems to be something important she's hiding.”
“She's only 10 years old, what kind of important thing does she have to hide?”
“She's going to turn 12 in two weeks, Jin.”
“She is?”
“Yes. Jin, you should at least remember the age of your daughter.”
“I do remember! I just didn't notice how fast time flew by. Nanami-chan will be 12 soon? Wow, that’s incredible, don’t you think?”
“Whatever you say.” Alice sighed. “… But at least you remembered our tenth anniversary.”
“Well,” Akanishi said, “someone reminded me.”
“Someone reminded you,” Alice repeated.
“Well, yes.”
“Who was it?”
“Oh, just someone,” Akanishi said hurriedly, and added, “I'm tired now. Good night.”
Alice whispered, “It was Kamenashi, wasn't it?”
Akanishi pretended to be asleep by then.
--
Years Ago, Off Screen - Jin
“Listen, people, listen!” Akanishi exclaimed right after swinging open the door to the dressing room.
Everyone assembled in the KAT-TUN dressing room looked towards him.
“It's a girl!” Akanishi exposed the news like he was revealing a profound secret.
“Why, thank you.” Tanaka rolled his eyes. “We know that already, Akanishi! You sent us all a message immediately after Alice informed you about it.”
Akanishi pouted. “You didn't write me back so I thought you might not have received the message at all...”
“No way, I sent you a very long congratulations message! With lots of emoticons.” Taguchi said in surprise.
“I did, too, without emoticons though,” Nakamaru said.
“Did you even check your cell phone afterwards?” Ueda asked, looking up from his boxing magazine.
“Oh, I forgot!” Akanishi laughed.
“Then don't blame it on us!” Tanaka yelled.
Akanishi simply laughed some more and goofed around with Tanaka.
Kamenashi, who stood by the side and watched Akanishi, asked suddenly, “Do you already have a name for her?”
“Yes,” Akanishi replied. “Her name will be Nanami! Akanishi Nanami!”
“Nanami…?” Kamenashi repeated the name with a frown.
“Why are you frowning?” Akanishi said indignantly.
“Not Tiara?” Kamenashi asked directly.
The others chirped in, “Right, Jin's always wanted to name his daughter Tiara, didn't he?”
“Didn’t he mention Raimu as well?”
“No, he said he wanted to name his little imaginary sister Raimu, but his daughter would be called Tiara.”
“I did and I do.” Akanishi sighed. “But Alice doesn’t like the name. She wanted her name to be Nanami, and I didn’t want to argue with her. I thought Tiara was a very pretty name. Oh well.”
“It is,” Kamenashi said insistently. “I think it is a pretty name.”
Akanishi looked at Kamenashi, surprised. Then he smiled at him, a bit bitterly, and thanked him quietly.
Later on, during the commercial break of the TV variety show, when they got a few minutes to relax, Akanishi heard Kamenashi muttering his daughter's name to himself over and over again.
“Why do you keep repeating the name?” he asked out of curiosity.
“It's a quite, well, common name, isn't it?” Kamenashi answered, staring at some undefined, distant point on the floor.
“Well...”
“Tiara would have been more uncommon, wouldn’t it?”
“It would.” Jin agreed.
“Yeah,” Kamenashi said.
Akanishi felt like he had to say something in return. He felt like Kamenashi wanted him to say something else as well. But Akanishi had so much he wanted to say that he didn't know how to begin.
Thus, the conversation ended at that.
--
Nanami was her father's precious daughter.
On the day she was born, his friends that were able to put a day off came to visit. Kamenashi was one of them. Akanishi was holding her by the time he arrived at the hospital.
When Kamenashi stretched out his index finger to touch her rosy cheeks, she moved her chubby little hands. Then, when he touched her hand, she grabbed his index finger and would not let go. His eyes shone and Akanishi saw it clearly because he had been staring at him the entire time.
“Can I hold her, Jin?” whispered Kamenashi, and he was looking at her like she was the most endearing creature he had ever seen.
Akanishi nodded and handed her over to him cautiously. He saw his eyes shone even more of delight and the sides of his lips curved up to form a small smile. Akanishi remembered faintly of a time when Kamenashi had looked at him the same way he was looking at his daughter at that moment, and he wondered what it meant.
She was Akanishi's precious daughter. On the day she was born, Kamenashi looked at him directly, smiled sincerely at him and even called him 'Jin' again.
She was the wicked witch that had cast a curse upon them, and she was also the good fairy that ultimately broke the evil spell.
She was Akanishi's daughter. She was Nanami.
On the day she was born, Akanishi felt like crying because of joy.
--
Some While Ago - Tiara
“I still remember the day you were born,” Kamenashi said to her one day out of the blue.
“You do?”
“Yes, you were still a little, tiny baby and Jin was carrying you in his arms in the hospital. He looked like he was the happiest person in the world.” He reminisced and smiled. Kamenashi looked at her fondly and said, nostalgically, “And now you’re turning 18. It’s been 18 years. 18 years. Time flies by so fast.”
She looked back at him and pondered about his words.
--
Today’s Now - Tiara
Kamenashi agreed to Nanami’s proposal soon afterwards. He said he was going to take responsibility no matter what happened, and thus they started dating.
Kamenashi never addressed Nanami’s father by his given name when he was speaking to her. It was always 'your father' or, when he was speaking to her mother, 'your husband.'
She noticed a habit Kamenashi had whenever they were kissing. He would brush her hair on the right side aside, and caress her face, gently touching the edge of her right eye. Every time, as if to confirm something.
She knew that he was looking for a mole, and she knew that she didn't have one.
She cast a glance at Kamenashi and saw that he looked exhausted.
“You should go to rest now,” she suggested, after they had finished dinner in a restaurant and were enjoying the rest of the red wine she had ordered. They had been dating for almost a month now.
“Nonsense, I'll take you home.”
“I can go home by myself.”
“It's already late, you shouldn't go on your own.”
“What if Papa sees us?”
Kamenashi took a sip from the wine, and then looked at her gravely.
She said, “Well, you can take me to the subway station if you insist.”
“Nanami-chan, don't you think it's about time?” Kamenashi asked.
“About time to do what?” she asked back.
“Isn’t it about time to tell your parents about us?”
“Not yet, Kazuya,” she said quietly as she got up. “Not yet.”
--
Then several days later, Akanishi approached his daughter with a solemn, almost angry, expression on his face in the living room.
“You've been going out with Kame a lot lately, haven't you?” he asked her.
“So what?” she replied, shrugging her shoulders. She didn’t like the interrogating tone of her father.
“Nanami,” Akanishi said, frowning. “Don't talk to me like that.”
Nanami grunted. “How do you know I was out with him and not with any of my friends?”
“I asked him to eat out, but he declined my invitation because he said he was going to meet you,” Akanishi said, almost gritting his teeth.
“He did? I feel honored that he thought our date was more important.”
“Date?” Akanishi growled at her. He was furious.
“Papa, just spit it out. What do you want to know?”
“I want to know what this is about!” he said, and threw the tabloid on the table.
She looked at the colored front page; saw Kamenashi and her caught during the moment they left the restaurant some days ago. On the picture, her face was hidden with a black stripe across her eyes, but people who knew her would still recognize her, as her father did. She didn't bother to read the headlines in scandalously huge type, because she could guess what they were about.
Akanishi continued, “They say that you two have been dining out or going out on numerous occasions!”
She raised an eyebrow. “You mean you actually read this article? And since when have you come to believe what was told in those tabloids? You should know better.”
“Stop beating around the bush and tell me what's going on!” Akanishi demanded heatedly.
“I've been to the hospital yesterday,” she said suddenly.
“…W-what?” Akanishi stuttered, not comprehending where she was heading.
“Papa, listen,” she drew in a deep breath, and said, “I'm pregnant.”
Nanami watched her father’s face turning pale the instant he fully grasped the indication of her confession.
“… You're joking, aren't you?” he asked his daughter.
Then Akanishi remembered that, back to years ago, he had asked Alice the same question. He also remembered that Tanaka had asked him the same question in the studio. Did he look as shocked as Tanaka looked back then? He also remembered how he had waited, waited and waited, waited until Kamenashi was gone to break the news to the others, because he didn't want to see Kamenashi's reaction, he didn't want to see him forcing himself to smile at him, as Akanishi knew he would. Just as Akanishi knew that his marriage would not make Kamenashi happy at all. But Akanishi wanted to have the security of a family, he wanted to settle down with someone he liked, and he liked Alice, indeed, but it was different, yes, different than what he felt for Kamenashi, but he still chose her. He would have given up everything to be with Kamenashi, he could have refused Alice easily, and yet, he had no other choice because there was... Nanami.
And Akanishi reached his limits.
“Why do you keep doing this?” He exploded. “WHY DO YOU KEEP DOING THIS?”
“I don't think I understand, Papa,” Nanami said, taken aback by her father’s sudden outburst.
“What's going on?” Alice came out of the kitchen with a face that reflected all her worries. “Why are you screaming like that, Jin?”
“IT'S ALWAYS BEEN YOU! YOU HAVE ALWAYS BEEN TEARING US APART. BACK THEN, YEARS AGO, AND EVEN NOW! WHY?”
Nanami took in a deep breath. “Why are you telling me such nonsense instead of telling me off like any other father would? Why are you not freaking out like any other father would and accuse me like any other father would? Oh yeah, right, you're not like any other father.”
“What-” Akanishi looked at his daughter, confused.
Nanami drew in a deep breath. “But tell me, why do you sound so jealous?”
“Nanami-chan...?” Alice began worriedly.
“You're jealous of me,” she said to her father determinedly. “Why? Is it because I'm a girl? Is it because I can call him by his given name without having to be concerned about anything?”
Akanishi said, “Nanami, you-”
“… Because I can tell him that I love him and that I want to marry him - but you can't? Not back then, not now. Never,” She said, her voice trembling like her entire body did, and tears threatened leave her eyes, soon, very soon. She held her head up high to prevent her tears from falling out of the corner of her eyes.
I can't back down and cry now, she thought, but in the end she couldn't help it. Not after her father had slapped her for the first time in her life.
--
Akanishi stormed Kamenashi’s apartment without warning and surprised its owner tremendously. Kamenashi didn’t have time to prepare himself to face Akanishi’s rage, and just when he was wondering how Akanishi was able to open the apartment door, he remembered that Akanishi knew where he hid the spare key.
“It's your fault! It's all your fault! How could you have done that? How could you do that to me!” Akanishi yelled at Kamenashi without closing the front door.
“Jin, calm down,” Kamenashi said.
“IT’S ALL YOUR FAULT!” Akanishi yelled, and grabbed his shoulders.
“What are you talking about-”
“About you and Nanami! That's what I'm talking about!”
“Jin, Jin. Stop. Don't scream like that. The neighbors...” Kamenashi tried to remind him.
“I don't care about your fucking neighbors!” Jin cried, forcing his way all inside the apartment and slamming the door behind him.
--
Back Then - Jin and Kame
Back in the days when they were still young, back when they were still boys, life seemed so easy. Although they knew deep, deep down that life really wasn't that easy at all. But back then they were young.
Kamenashi still remembered the scent of the hot summer evening in the city. The innocent sound of laughter, the fun they had when work was finally over.
In the brief moment of joy he forgot everything around him, and before he knew it he had kissed Akanishi.
He didn’t think much about it, he didn’t even grasp what he had done, and he was still smiling until he saw Akanishi's widened eyes. He hadn’t meant it to be like that. He just got carried away by the moment.
Then he saw Akanishi blushing and he started blushing, too. Or did he start blushing first, and then saw that Akanishi was blushing? It didn't matter. The thrilling sensation he felt when Akanishi kissed him back was more unforgettable.
They were too young back then.
They believed that, perhaps, there would be a chance for them. They didn’t know about the price they would have to pay to be with the other.
--
The first time they went all the way was awkward and sticky. None of them really remembered when and where they did it, but they did it.
Thinking back, Kamenashi thought it was ridiculous that they decided who was going to top by playing rock-paper-scissors. Kamenashi could have smacked himself for forgetting that Akanishi was very lucky when it came to games like that.
Akanishi might be good in rock-paper-scissors, but he wasn’t very good in bed for the first time.
Consequently, the first coherent sentence Akanishi uttered after ejaculation was an apology to Kame.
Kamenashi’s first response consisted of a curse. “I'm never going to do it again! Never. Never. Never!” Kamenashi declared, hiding his face with his hands.
“Kame, I'm so sorry...” Akanishi repeated sincerely and kissed Kamenashi’s hands gently.
“Didn't it hurt you, too?” Kamenashi asked, peeking at Akanishi through his fingers.
“It did. At first... But then it started feeling good and, er...”
Kamenashi's face flushed with Akanishi's at the same time, and to break the awkward moment that had emerged he murmured, “It really hurt.”
“Well, we can improve next time...” Akanishi suggested.
“There won't be a next time! No way! I'm not going to do it ever again!” Kamenashi yelled, turning around and digging his head into the pillow.
“Then... I could be bottom next time.”
Kamenashi turned his head back to Akanishi and looked at him incredulously.
“Not okay?” Akanishi asked weakly.
“Jin, are you M?” Kamenashi asked, frowning.
“Hah? I was trying to be nice and that’s your response?” Akanishi exclaimed, outraged.
“Well... I was just talking about how much it hurt and then you tell me that you want to be bottom...” Kamenashi sighed.
“But, Kame, I love you, and I want to have sex with you!” Akanishi said sincerely.
“Ew, stop it!” Kamenashi demanded loudly. “I don't need this kind of love declaration! This is so disgusting!”
“This is so not disgusting!”
“You are disgusting!”
“No way!”
“Yes way! Ouch, ouch, ouch! Jin, it hurts!”
“Oh, I'm sorry!”
They argued about more useless things. Then they laughed and kissed. Then they drifted to sleep in each other’s arms. And they were happy. Back then.
--
Today’s Now - Jin and Kame
After waking up from a brief nap, Kamenashi found himself on his bed, and Akanishi languidly sitting beside him, smoking with the ashtray in his hand. Akanishi’s upper body was exposed to the dim moonlight through the window. The scent of sex filled the room along with the one from Akanishi’s favorite cigarette.
That part of Kamenashi’s body felt like it was burning. It was as if he could still feel Akanishi inside him, and the memory of the sensation made him shudder. It’s been so long since last time.
Kamenashi’s body was aching all over when he tried to get up. He was getting old, he thought sulkily.
Akanishi turned to look at Kamenashi, and offered the rest of his cigarette to him. Kamenashi took it immediately. Then Akanishi also handed him the ashtray wordlessly.
Akanishi watched him smoke in silence, and then asked all of a sudden, “Do you love her?”
Kamenashi had asked him the same question long time ago. Now their roles reversed, and Akanishi wondered whether Kamenashi had been as nervous when he had been waiting for his answer.
“I love her,” Kamenashi said without hesitation.
Akanishi’s body trembled slightly. He had been expecting it, but it still hurt to hear the answer. Did Kamenashi feel the same way back then?
“Kazu... Why did you choose her?” Akanishi asked resentfully. He wanted to know. He really wanted to know.
“I love her,” Kamenashi said, and extinguished the cigarette on the ashtray. “But only as your child.”
Akanishi looked at him, startled. “But then… why did you… and Nanami…?”
“To be honest,” Kamenashi said slowly. “I don’t think I ever slept with her. I woke up with her in the same hotel room one night, and she said we did it the night before, but I don’t think it’s true. When she told me that she was grinning like she always does when she’s pulling pranks on someone.”
“But she said she was pregnant!”
“She is pregnant?” Kamenashi asked in astonishment.
“You didn’t know that?”
“No!”
“Maybe she was about to tell you, but then I confronted her and she blurted it out to me first.”
“…”
“But, Kazu, this means that you actually slept with her, you bastard!”
“Who are you calling a bastard!” Kamenashi exclaimed angrily.
“Damn it!” Akanishi ruffled through his hair in frustration. “Kazu, you’re like 20 years older than her! And if you marry Nanami you’ll be my son in law. This is so fucked up!”
“Who said I was going to marry her?” Kamenashi frowned.
“But you… you and her, you two did…” Akanishi stuttered, and was suddenly having a hard time to express his words.
Kamenashi bit his lip. “I said I didn’t.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“So you won’t marry Nanami?”
“I didn’t say that. If I- Woah, what are you doing!” Kamenashi began, but when Akanishi threw his whole weight upon him he ended his sentence in an irritated cry.
“Kazu!” Akanishi said. His eyes were shining. “Kazu, I’m so happy that you won’t become my son-in-law.”
Kamenashi tried to free himself from Akanishi’s grip, in vain, and looked at him wordlessly.
“Don’t marry her,” Akanishi said finally.
Kamenashi didn’t respond, instead he slightly pushed Akanishi away and proceeded to get up from bed.
Akanishi almost panicked. He held back Kamenashi by his arm, and said hastily, “Kame, I want to be with you. I really do.”
“Jin. You’re so selfish.”
“I know that. But I can’t help it.”
“You can't leave Alice,” Kamenashi said definitely. “She needs you. She has no one to take care of her but you.”
“What about you?” Jin asked softly. “Do you have anyone to take care of you?”
“I can take care of myself.”
“No, you can't. You've never succeeded. You've always needed others to care for you, to worry about you, to watch out for you... Kazu, you need me just as much as Alice does.”
“Jin, I don’t need you,” Kamenashi said, his words almost a whisper. “Don’t compare me to your wife.”
“No, Kazu. I’m not. I just want to take care of you. I want you to be the one I can take care of.” Akanishi paused, and then said, “Kazu, I love you.”
Kamenashi asked then, “If you love me, why did you marry Alice?”
After a while, Akanishi confessed, “You've been drifting away from me. I was afraid. I wanted to take care of you, I liked to think that you needed me, but then you didn't need me anymore. I just wanted someone... someone who was dependent on me.”
“Jin, I know. I understand. I've always known,” Kamenashi said. “Jin, you're a very gentle person, who can’t get by on your own. I know. That’s one of the reasons why I love you.”
Kamenashi smiled slightly at him. Akanishi thought that he had not seen him smiling like that in a long while, and at the same time he wished that he could see him smiling like that more often.
Kamenashi said, “So about Nanami-chan and me. Do you believe me?”
“Of course I do! I know that you would never sleep with a woman. Not even if she looks a lot like me.”
Kamenashi kicked Akanishi on the side. “Idiot!”
Akanishi giggled. Then he said suddenly, “It's like I'm having an affair with you.”
“Jin, it's not like you're having an affair with you, you are having an affair with me.” Kamenashi sighed.
Akanishi chuckled some more and held Kamenashi closer to him.
“Kazu…” he whispered. “… I have lived together with Alice for 18 years. We’ve been through good times and bad times. We raised up Nanami together. We did so many things together. I’d have to lie if I said I didn’t have feelings for her or didn’t feel guilty about anything. I’d like to make up for every bad thing I’ve done to her. But I don’t know how…”
Kamenashi listened in silence.
“I don’t know how I could ever make up to her and Nanami for my selfishness. Even after 18 years, I still want to be with you, Kazu.”
“Jin,” Kame said, and he looked tired, very tired; tired and sad, “We're not teenagers anymore, Jin.”
“But we can pretend, can’t we?” Akanishi said.
Then he leaned in and kissed Kamenashi. When Kamenashi didn’t fight back and on its instead returned the kiss, Akanishi was overjoyed.
The sun was rising. Night would become day, and this night would fade away and become another day. They would return to their actual life and they would still have to say good-bye.
--
Today’s Now - Alice
Alice had always been waiting for Akanishi for as long as she remembered.
She never thought much about Akanishi before she met him; frankly speaking she’d never been much of a Johnny’s fan. But she knew about KAT-TUN and Akanishi Jin because her best friend was part of Akanishi’s huge circle of friends.
It was also thanks to her friend that she got to know Akanishi. Alice’s first impression of him was that he was a very handsome and funny guy, but no more than that. Indeed, she looked forward to see him again, but she didn’t give it much a thought.
She realized that she fell in love with him on their fifth meeting.
They sat next to each other in the nightclub Akanishi regularly frequented; they were enjoying their drinks and making random comments about the music choice of the DJ.
“You remind me of someone,” Akanishi said suddenly. “I don’t know why, maybe it’s your eyes, I don’t know, but you remind me of someone.”
She looked at him questioningly, and she saw the forlorn and abandoned expression on his face in the wild and colorful lights of the dark nightclub.
She fell in love with a man who was heart-broken, and she wanted to save him.
After meeting Kamenashi, Alice realized from the way Akanishi behaved around him that the someone Akanishi was talking about was, without a doubt, Kamenashi Kazuya.
She was all that Kamenashi wasn’t anymore, and she thought that was the way things were supposed to be.
So Alice waited for Akanishi.
She didn’t have to wait too long for their first kiss and their first date. But she had to wait a lot longer to take their relationship a step further.
Then it almost took all of her patience before he agreed to marry her.
After the marriage, she believed she wouldn’t have to wait for Akanishi anymore.
She was wrong. She was still waiting for him. Waiting for him to settle his eyes on her.
A little longer, just a little bit longer, she told herself over and over again.
But when Akanishi didn’t return home the night when their pregnant daughter cried herself to sleep, Alice thought, perhaps it was time to give up waiting.
--
Today’s Now - Tiara
Sometimes, life takes turns when you least expect it.
That was what Kamenashi thought when he received a message from Nanami three weeks later.
She asked whether he had time for a meeting before she became too busy with moving to a new apartment with her boyfriend, who was going to become her husband in the near future.
Kamenashi wrote back to her straight away and arranged a meeting.
She waved at him, when she spotted him through the huge window of the café. It was when Kamenashi noticed that she wasn’t a little girl anymore. She was indeed a grown-up woman, who was soon going to be a mother.
“Is everything going well?” Kamenashi asked, as he sat down opposite of her.
“Yes, it is. My boyfriend found a nice apartment. It's not as cheap as the other one that we also had in consideration but it had a bigger bathroom and was closer to the inner city.”
“Do you need any help with moving? If you do just tell me.”
“Oh no, not at all, don't worry, Kazuya.”
“Why did you call me here?”
“… I want to apologize,” she said, “because I lied to you to make you date me, and maybe eventually marry me.”
“Why did you do all that?” Kamenashi asked. “Your true motive is not because you love me and want to marry me, is it?”
“Let me tell you something,” she said slowly, and sipped on her coffee.
Then she began, “Once there was a family. There was a father, a mother and a little girl. I was the little girl. It was my family. It was my happy family. I wanted my family to stay the way it has always been, but what I wanted has only remained the same on its surface. It has began to rot on the inside, in places I didn't look, couldn't see.”
She paused. “It's like a house made of wood. Nobody knew it had a woodboring beetle's egg laid in it. It was a small egg that grew and turned into a larva that began to consume the wood from the inside. From time to time the traces of the destruction process could be viewed from the outside, but they were so tiny and seemed so insignificant that they were merely ignored, brushed aside and finally forgotten. The larva ate the wood until nothing was left inside, it grew into an adult insect and flew away, leaving the wood, empty as it was, and it was only shortly afterwards that the whole house collapsed. I didn't want this to happen to my house, you know?”
“I know,” Kamenashi simply said.
“I was hoping they wouldn't divorce. Now I'm not sure anymore,” she said. “I was tired of the way things went. Everything was blurry and none of you would step up and settle things. At first, I didn't want you to break up Papa and Mama. I was afraid that you and Papa would catch each other's eyes and recognize the feelings you had for each other one day and then Papa would leave Mama. I didn't want it to happen, so I tried to get your attention, to make you turn your attention to me and to make you forget about Papa, and choose me instead. I thought I could do that. I noticed that you were seeing me as a link to papa, to keep being close to him, you were using me and I used you.”
She paused again and lit a cigarette before continuing. “But in the end I failed. I failed terribly. I thought I was winning, but then I realized: Papa has been thinking about me the same way. He loved me because I was the one keeping you two together. Mama probably thinks the same. I'm her connection to Papa. Without me he wouldn't have married her in the first place. Do you know what Papa told me when I asked her why he married Mama? He said 'Because she had you.' Because she had me. Not because he loved her? He would never have married her had I not been there? In the end, you all didn't love me as much as you did to the person I was connecting you to. After all I'm no more than a mere shadow of my father…”
Kamenashi interrupted immediately, “That's not true, Nanami-chan, you know that's not true...”
Nanami contradicted cynically, “What is not true? Even if I really carried your child you would not marry me, not as long as Papa didn’t agree. Kazuya, whenever it involves love, you've always been Papa's captive and always will be.”
Kamenashi opened his mouth, wanting to say something in return, but no words would leave him.
“Also, one of my major miscalculation was that you both knew about your feelings from begin on. What I did just brought you two closer, didn’t it?” she said bitterly. “And I'm a terrible story-teller, aren't I?”
“No, you’re not,” Kamenashi said immediately. “And believe me when I say this, we all love you dearly for who you are, and not who you connect us to.”
Nanami closed her eyes and said with a little smile, “Thank you.”
Kamenashi smiled, too. “So I'm a woodboring beetle in your eyes?”
Nanami chuckled and opened her eyes. “No, you're the most handsome woodboring beetle in my eyes.”
“Big difference,” Kamenashi grumbled. Then he added, “But I'd never leave your family. I’m serious.”
“You mean, you'd never leave Papa,” she corrected.
They sat at the table silently for a while.
“Your boyfriend. Is he treating you well?”
“Yes,” she said, and smiled. “I can tell that he really loves me for who I am.”
”Do you love him?” Kamenashi asked at last.
“I do,” she said, and stubbed out the cigarette. “But Kazuya...”
“Yes?”
“Most of the time you don't end up marrying the one you love most,” she said.
Kamenashi didn’t say anything as response.
“I'm like Papa after all,” she said with a sigh. “Well, compared to you, my child's father is a much better match for me. It’s true. Everything will somehow work out in the end. So don’t worry.”
They left the café after Nanami had finished her cup of coffee. Kamenashi insisted upon paying the bill although Nanami said it was supposed to be her treat. Then he offered her a ride, which she declined.
They parted with Nanami’s promise that she’d call Kamenashi again once she’d settled down in her new home.
Kamenashi climbed into his car with a heavy heart, thinking back about the conversation he had had with Nanami.
Then his cell phone started ringing.
Kamenashi couldn’t help but smile upon seeing that the call was from Akanishi Jin.
--
Today’s Now - Jin and Kame
“Kazu,” Akanishi said, setting the tabloid he was reading aside.
“Yes?” Kamenashi answered, after quickly stealing a glance at the headlines top of a huge picture of Akanishi from their latest photoshoot along with a picture of Alice and Nanami, before Akanishi tossed it away completely and hid it from his view.
“Will you hold my hand now?” Akanishi asked.
“Sure,” Kamenashi answered without hesitation, and reached out for Akanishi’s hand.
Kamenashi smiled at Akanishi, who smiled back faintly, but gladly in return, and tightened his hold on his hand.
- We're not teenagers anymore, Jin. We're not young enough anymore to afford the price we have to pay.
- But we can still pretend, can't we?
The End
A/A/N: Some image songs!
Words That We Couldn't Say: Song by Kanno Yohko/The Seatbelts, included in Cowboy Bebop Blue, the third Cowboy Bebop soundtrack album. mediafire
Patience: To me, this songs describes Jin and Alice's relationship very well. By Take That, included in the single with the same name and the album Beautiful World. mediafire